Beverly Connor - Dead Secret

Diane looked at her watch. “It’s three o’clock now. We’re locking down at six o’clock today, including the restaurant. The only people who will stay will be museum security personnel and the crime lab crew. Mr. Emery, I want your security people fresh when the bomb unit gets here tomorrow, so you and yours can go home now for rest, and Chanell’s people can secure the building until tomorrow afternoon. Is that okay with you, Chanell?”

She nodded. “I’ll notify my people and call in a couple of officers on leave to double up until Mr. Emery’s people come in tomorrow,” she said.

“Okay, all of you tell any of your people who will be affected,” Diane said. “But do not discuss with anyone what has been said in this room. The official reason for closing is a breakdown of environmental controls, to be repaired over the weekend. Security is extremely important. We can’t take the chance that any information might leak out of here about what we’re doing. Maybe we’ll get lucky and resolve this whole thing in a few days and can get back to normal.”

That was possible, she thought. Sometimes it was like falling dominoes when they got a critical mass of evidence-just one more piece could make them start falling, and suddenly a case was solved.

Maybe that critical evidence would be the DNA. Diane realized that she was counting on their getting DNA that she had tricked her captors into giving her. There was a good chance that the spittle didn’t contain any, or there wasn’t enough.

She sent the staff away to make plans. Now came the task that she dreaded most-calling her parents and telling them that she was the reason for her mother’s nightmare.

Diane called Daniel Reynolds first. She told him part of the story-leaving out the danger to the museum. The fewer people who knew about that the better.

“I need you to contact the federal marshals’ office, the FBI, and the Bureau of Prison authorities; alert them that the danger might not be over, that someone still may hack into their systems to hurt a member of my family.”

“That must be some kind of case you’re working on, to worry someone this much,” he said.

“That’s just it-the events that started this whole thing happened in 1942. Most of the people involved would be very old or dead.”

“Their descendants wouldn’t.”

Diane was silent for a moment. Of course, she thought, people didn’t live out their lives in a vacuum. They had children and grandchildren. And great-grandchildren, just like Jane Doe-Flora Martin had a great-grandchild. People built lives, reputations and fortunes, and their descendants often depended on those reputations and fortunes. Reynolds’s remark put her mind on had a new line of inquiry, a new way to look at the problem.

“From the silence, I must have gotten you thinking,” said the lawyer.

“You did, indeed. And it seems so obvious.”

“I’ll get on this right away. I suppose you’ll be calling your folks.”

“Yes. After I hang up with you.”

“Then I won’t keep you. Don’t worry about this end. I’ll see that the right people get on this.”

She called Gerald first. She caught him at his office and told him essentially what she had told Daniel Reynolds.

“I just wanted you to know, because they are going to be needing support, and they won’t want it from me.”

“God, Diane. I’m not sure I understand this. This sounds more like the Russian mob or something.”

“It is extreme, I agree. Are you and Susan doing okay?”

“We’re still living under the same roof and being civil to each other, so I guess we’re doing fine. Alan took some vacation time, I understand. Apparently, it was a blow to him for you to think he’d stab you.”

“That, and being wrong. He always had a hard time with that.”

“Your dad’s been at home all week with your mother, so they should be together. You want me to call Susan and give her a heads-up?”

“Yes, thanks. She might want to go on over there.”

When Diane hung up, she waited with her hand on the phone, dreading what was coming. A knot formed in her stomach, making her nauseated. She thought about calling Gerald back and asking him to tell them. But instead, she dialed her parents’ number.

Diane sat alone at her desk, her head down on her arms, sobbing.

“Diane?”

She felt a hand on her shoulder and heard Mike’s voice. She didn’t remember him ever using her first name. Surprised and embarrassed, she lifted her head. She was still holding the telephone receiver tight in her hand. She put it back in its cradle.

“Mike. Sorry. You caught me at a bad time.”

Diane grabbed a Kleenex and wiped her eyes. Mike stood in front of her desk, a deep crease between his brows, his light brown eyes filled with puzzled concern.

At least he can see me off my pedestal, she thought as she blotted her eyes again.

“Can I help? Is it Frank?”

Diane tried to smile as she met his gaze. “No. It’s my parents. I had to tell them that what happened to Mother was my fault.”

“How was it your fault?”

“Did Neva tell you about any of this?”

“A little. Something about identity theft and someone’s hacking into police records causing her to be put in prison for a week.”

“It was really much worse for her than that. It was done to get me out of town, away from the crime scene evidence. Mike, I shouldn’t be telling you this. I’m sorry. Did you need something?”

He shook his head and sat down in the stuffed chair across from her desk. “No. I just dropped by. Andie wasn’t at her desk, so I just came in-I’m sorry I disturbed you.”

“It’s all right, really. You look better. How is your recovery?”

“Better. The doctor put me on an exercise program that Neva and I can both live with,” he said flashing a brief smile.

“She’s just looking out for you.”

“I know, and she’s doing a good job of it. I’m a lousy patient. My mother used to say that when I was sick as a kid, she got me well in self-defense.”

“It sounds like you have nice, caring parents.”

“They are. They live way out in the country on a farm. Dad grows grapes, muscadines and scuppernongs. Dad’s always been a farmer. Mother’s always been a housewife. They’re just plain folk.”

Mike’s small talk sounded awkward, not like his usual confident, glib self. She’d made him uncomfortable. Tears leaked from her eyes again. She imagined his parents loved their son very much. She envied him.

“What happened couldn’t have been your fault,” he said.

“Look at everything, Mike-my daughter is murdered, Frank is shot, you are shot and stabbed, my poor, naive mother is thrown in a hellhole of a prison.” And now the museum, she thought. “The common denominator is me. Hell, the break-in at Neva’s probably has something to do with me.”

“No. None of it.” He leaned forward. “I certainly don’t hold you responsible, and if I remember right, what happened to Frank wasn’t because of you at all; it was to stop him and his investigation.”

Mike reached out and took her hand. His touch was warm and safe-feeling, and right now human contact felt good. She squeezed back. After a moment, Diane slipped her hand from his.

“My mother told me she hates me for what I did-for what I am.”

Diane didn’t mean to blurt it out that way. After complaining about information leaks, she was becoming a faucet.

“I’m sure she didn’t mean it.”

In his world he probably couldn’t imagine a parent hating her child. But her mother had suffered horribly, and Diane could see her mother’s point of view. If she had been the daughter they wanted, if she weren’t involved in solving crimes, all that happened wouldn’t have happened. And in that, her mother was right. The small headway she had made with her family was now irreparably damaged. Even Susan was angry with her again. She had been with her parents when Diane called and she couldn’t resist weighing in with her opinion of Diane’s guilt.